Weekly Climate and Energy News Roundup

Brought to You by SEPP (www.SEPP.org) The Science and Environmental Policy Project

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Quote of the Week: “It is in the admission of ignorance and the admission of uncertainty that there is a hope for the continuous motion of human beings in some direction that doesn’t get confined, permanently blocked, as it has so many times before in various periods in the history of man.” Richard Feynman [H/t Roger Cohen]

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Number of the Week: 70%

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THIS WEEK:

APS: In 2007 the American Physical Society (APS) issued an absolutist statement on Climate Change that greatly disturbed a number of its senior fellows. In 2009, about 300 physicists petitioned the APS petitioned to modify the statement. The statement was not modified, but augmented with a lengthy addition. The turmoil continues. Roger Cohen, a Fellow of the Society has posted on the web site of Anthony Watts his expression of dissatisfaction with the APS. This has led to an exchange with Warren S. Warren. The exchange is an excellent read on what is wrong when a few in a science society take an absolutist position concerning a subject that requires open investigation and debate. Please see links under APS Frontline.

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PBS Frontline: The Public Broadcasting System aired a special on its “Frontline” series titled “Climate of Doubt.” The first part consisted of interviews and clips of those who express skepticism to the view that human emissions of greenhouse gases (GHG), especially carbon dioxide (CO2), are causing unprecedented and dangerous global warming. This was followed by interviews with alarmists who were presented as the mainstream scientists. Certainly the alarmists are mainstream in that they are the ones who receive extensive government support. Later, in private comments, Fred Singer thought his interview was well presented, especially when compared with presentations in the past. The views of others varied. Roy Spencer was disturbed because part of his head and comments were used in the trailer, but he was not interviewed for the program.

Perhaps more revealing of the entire episode was a Live Chat on Thursday afternoon with those who organized the program. They were the film’s producer, Catherine Upin, the correspondent, John Hockenberry, and the “resident expert”, Elizabeth Kolbert, of the New Yorker. Prior to the chat, SEPP submitted three questions on topics covered. One was the frequently cited 97 to 98% percent of climate scientists “consensus” claims, which are based on extensively manipulated of opinion polls, making the results trivial. The second was on the recent statement from HadCRU that there has been no appreciable increase in temperatures for 16 years, a period in which the models project an increase of about 0.3 deg C (over 0.5 deg F). What would it take for journalists to realize there are major problems with the climate models and the 90 to 99% certainty is based on opinion not rigorous science? The third question focused on the constant, largely unsubstantiated claims that oil companies are funding skeptics and the failure of journalists to report the extent of government funding of the alarmists.

During the Live Chat, SEPP submitted four comments. One on the burden of proof – climate alarmists have not performed adequate testing of a hypothesis on CO2 caused global warming. A second challenging a statement that the poll appearing in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science was peer reviewed, but it is trivial nonetheless. The third comment challenged the “resident expert” Elizabeth Kolbert who stated: “A very interesting look at the connections between the tobacco industry and the climate “skeptic” industry can be found in the book Merchants of Doubt.” The response challenged Ms. Kolbert to read and comment on Fred Singer’s rebuttal to this book’s ad hominem attacks.

But most revealing was a comment by correspondent John Hockenberry:

“The saddest thing about this story is that we heard mostly absolute certainty and dismissive confidence among our skeptic friends while it was our scientist friends were quick to say that doubt is how science is conducted, people questioning each other’s work all the time. The doubt of the scientists was always real but was always about how much we know about the planet and need to know not about the trend of global warming.

Their search for truth and quest to challenge each other’s findings was exploited as “debate” and “uncertainty” by people in the political world. In some ways the scientists didn’t have a chance in this battle… but that is my personal opinion and some of our scientists would not have agreed with me.”

To which SEPP inquired: did you ever ask the climate establishment scientists why the IPCC declared a 90 to 99% certainty in the models and their findings? The 90 to 99% certainty was in the EPA endangerment finding and was accepted by the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia.

Given the slow pace, and the long pauses in the program, it was obvious tough questions of these global warming / climate change expert journalists would not be aired. Also, it was apparent the opinion polls weigh heavily on these expert journalists.

The saddest thing about this story is the blatant irresponsibility of PBS to understand the story. Please see links under PBS Frontline.

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ADDENDUM: Months ago Patrick Michaels announced he and a few collogues are preparing a point by point rebuttal to the report by the US Global Change Research Program (USGCRP): Global Climate Change Impacts in the US (2009). Along with the 2007 report be the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, and a report by National Research Council, the USGCRP report provide the foundation for the EPA questionable finding that GHG, particularly CO2, emissions endanger human life and welfare. Now alarmists are outraged that the advance copies of the new report, ADDENDUM: Global Climate Change Impacts in the United States looks like the previous report. The CATO imprint on the back cover is apparently overlooked by the alarmists. Please see link under Challenging the Orthodoxy.

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US Overtaking Saudi Arabia in Oil? Some analysts are projecting that the US will overtake Saudi Arabia in oil production in the near future – around 2020. Others object to these statements stating they are based on statistical sleights of hand. Whether or not the US (or North America) overtakes Saudi Arabia is not that important. What is important is that thanks to modern hydraulic fracturing of dense shale and offshore drilling (whenever permitted), oil production in the US is expanding greatly. Since production costs in the US remain high, there is doubt if the era of “cheap oil” will return in the near future. Oil is traded on the global market, and US production influences that market but does not determine it. The lower cost producers that have significant capability of expanding are more influential determinants, such as Saudi Arabia.

Some economists are questioning the belief that affordable energy is vital for economic growth. Certainly, affordable energy is not a sufficient condition for economic growth. That is, other conditions, or components, are needed. For example, oil is heavily subsidized in Egypt and Iran, but they are not experiencing significant growth. But under proper conditions, affordable energy can promote growth. For example, affordable energy is vital to modern agriculture. Modern fertilizers need oil or natural gas feedstock. Areas of the US where natural gas is low cost and appears to be affordable for a long term are experiencing significant growth, which the country as a whole is not.

External costs are other complications added by economists to the issue. Sometimes these are real, such as in cities in the US in the 20s. But, economic growth allowed the country to devote significant resources to clean up these external costs. Now, in the US external costs are largely exaggerated, such as by the EPA. Please see links Energy Issues – US and Articles # 2 and # 3.

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EPA on the Verge: A number of commentators, including Fred Singer, are expressing concern about the plans of EPA immediately after the election on November 6. It is clear that EPA has held back proposed regulations that are highly controversial. Please see Article #1, #3 and #5, and links under EPA and other Regulators on the March

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Oh’ Mann: Michael Mann has sued the National Review Online and the Competitive Enterprise Institute for defamation and “intentional infliction of emotional distress.” (from the Washington Post.). The complaint states that: “… Mr. Man and his colleagues were awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.” and “… personal defamation of a Nobel prize recipient.”

The award was given to the IPCC, not personally to Mr. Mann, who was a participant in the IPCC. Some may consider the distinction to be just a technicality, just as some consider the body of research on climate history that was buried Mr. Mann’s hockey-stick as just a technicality. Mr. Mann may find that he will face questions that are a bit more strident than asked by the Penn State officials who he claims exonerated his research. Please see links under Oh Mann!

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Storm’s A’coming: According to forecasts, the Mid-Atlantic States are about to be hit by a large storm with low category 1 hurricane winds. (Category 1 wind speed 75–95 mph (65–82 kts, 33–42 m/s), http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saffir%E2%80%93Simpson_Hurricane_Scale). The moon is almost full, so tidal areas may experience a strong storm surge on top of spring (flood) tides which could result in significant coastal erosion and flooding. Already some alarmists are associating the storm with global warming / climate change. Please see links under Changing Weather and Below the Bottoms Line.

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Amplifications and Corrections: Tom Sheahen correctly stated that the conversion for PgC/yr to Billions of tonnes of CO2 per year is by multiplying by 3.67. TWTW left out the Billions.

Clyde Spencer correctly suggested that TWTW should not use the term ocean acidity unless the pH is actually below 7. This will be followed to the extent possible.

Norman Kalmanovitch pointed out that the period of no warming in the HadCRU data, as stated in the article by David Rose, started in the year the Kyoto Protocol became effective, 1997. The goal of the Protocol was to stop global warming and it did! If one jumps to causal relationships, one could state the Kyoto Protocol was the most effective international agreement ever.

TWTW incorrectly quoted Angeline Purdy of the Department of Justice as stating: “The models have been validated.” The quote came from imperfect personal notes. A subsequent check of the transcript (which is not available on the web) failed to reveal such a direct statement. Ms. Purdy argued that the models have been validated, at length, but did not make such as simple statement. TWTW will endeavor not to make such a mistake in the future.

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Number of the Week: 70%. According to an article in the Wall Street Journal, in the US the cost of natural gas is about 70% of the cost of manufacturing nitrogen fertilizer. As the cost of this component comes down, its percentage share will come down as well.

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ARTICLES:

For the numbered articles below please see this week’s TWTW at: http://www.sepp.org. The articles are at the end of the pdf.

Reference: Christiansen, B. and Ljungqvist, F.C. 2012. The extra-tropical Northern Hemisphere temperature in the last two millennia: reconstructions of low-frequency variability. Climate of the Past 8: 765-786.

Commissioners Hedegaard and Oettinger admitted the proposals were “not perfect” but emphasised the 5% cap on food-based biofuels that did make it into the final proposal. This is supposed to cap conventional biofuel production at current levels. The problem is that this cap is not really a cap, at least not on the production of these biofuels. It is a reporting cap under the EU’s renewable energy directive: member states will only be able to use (and subsidise) food-based biofuels to meet half of a 10% target for renewable energy in transport by 2020.

[SEPP Comment: The clarity of bureaucracy.]

Large-scale production of biofuels made from algae poses sustainability concerns

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8 thoughts on “Weekly Climate and Energy News Roundup”

“Microbes and Nature
American Academy of Microbiology, 2011 [H/t Dennis Ambler]
FAQ: Microbes and Oil Spills, 2011
[SEPP Comment: Is it not time to develop this natural resource to be available for any future oil spills?]”

Let’s not be too eager to transfer living organisms around the planet. The bugs in the Gulf of Mexico have always been there and are part of the ecosystem. Adding them to the Arctic or North Sea may have unknowable consequences.

SEPP submitted three questions on topics covered. One was the frequently cited 97 to 98% percent of climate scientists “consensus” claims, which are based on extensively manipulated of opinion polls, making the results trivial.

Here’s a new (?) critique of the 97% figure that I hope you will validate and publicize:

I speculate that the majority of the alarmed “climate scientists” in those 97% surveys are not specialists in the CAUSES of climate change (attribution), but in the impacts of and remedies for such change. Their opinion that the cause of global warming is CO2 carries no more weight than that of any other non-climate scientist. It a was slick equivocation, highly successful until now, for the pollsters to use “climate scientist” in two senses to impute expertise in climate-change causation to a group of “climate scientists” that lack it. It was unethical to have kept this sample-bias in the background or under the rug. The “consensus” might be mostly an artefact, the product of CON-CENSUSes.

The surveys showing a high consensus on an anthropogenic cause of global warming restricted their sample to scientists with the highest number of publication on the topic (one survey set the bar at 20 articles with the word “climate” in each). Who won’t usually fit this profile? Scientists who study the causes of global warming, primarily chemists, physicists, and atmospheric specialists. (Modelers are a borderline case.) Their findings and cogitations are based on hard (difficult) science, which ought to reduce their publication rate to far below that of biologists and environmentalists who write about possible impacts or remedies.

This is powerful ammo. Its force, if true, is amplified by the fact that the truth has been twisted and concealed for so long by so many warmists. And by the way no critical thinking was applied to the claim by journalists–or by the supposed champions of critical thinking, the capital-S “Skeptics” of the CSICOP sect.

Please add the classic “Continue reading” link somewhere at the beginning… this article is huge and it is being presented entirely in the main page, forcing a big scroll if you want to reach the other topics.

Exploitation of scientific uncertainty is far from the adulteration of data to achieve political ends. Altering temperature data to produce warming, making adjustments the reverse of those called for by the urban heat island effect, and cobbling up data to show false past temperatures do NOT constitute uncertainty but, instead, a corruption of the scientists themselves. The greenhouse effect as they tout it does NOT exist; it goes against the solidly established laws of thermodynamics. A cool gas simply cannot warm the surface, no matter how much they need it to for their political goals and no matter what the gas.

Please add the classic “Continue reading” link somewhere at the beginning… this article is huge and it is being presented entirely in the main page, forcing a big scroll if you want to reach the other topics.

The third comment challenged the “resident expert” Elizabeth Kolbert who stated: “A very interesting look at the connections between the tobacco industry and the climate “skeptic” industry can be found in the book Merchants of Doubt.” The response challenged Ms. Kolbert to read and comment on Fred Singer’s rebuttal to this book’s ad hominem attacks.

I noticed several years ago the striking similarity between the tactics of the proponents of Catastrophic Anthropogenic Global Warming and the movement for Gun Control. After the gun control groups overstepped their mandate with The Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act (the 1994 Assault Weapons Ban), they have proceeded to receive regular and ongoing beat-downs. With the Supreme Court case of District of Columbia v. Heller in 2008, gun control has passed from most main stream attention.

2,500 al-Qaeda have set up five training camps in Iraq, just as their oil production was forecast to triple by 2020. They are being forced into backpedaling from new optimism for their future. They just moved way up.